Hats!

I love hats! And I really love hats on these two kids! :) Here is Hadleigh in her new pink flower hat that Bryan and I got her, and Riley in his monkey hat that Pa and SuSu got him while we were in New York City! I don't think either one of them could be any cuter, or that I could love them any more than I do.

Reading Up on Ukraine Facts!

I've always liked to look at globes, the world just seems so big to me! And when I travel places, I like to know "where" I am in relationship to home or other places nearby.

Here I am in NYC doing my favorite thing, reading my map! And no, I am NOT ashamed to pull out a map and look like a tourist. This pic was several years ago, and now I have an iphone, but I find that technology is sometimes annoying. Annoying in the sense that it always seems to fail at the most inconvenient time! You'll never beat a REAL paper map or a REAL paper book or a REAL game of bowling, etc....I'll save more thoughts on that for another post. :)


I know some people hop the globe, but I'm not one of them. Yes, we travel frequently..but generally not TOO far. So this is a big trip for me! First of all, I will say I am so thankful to live in the United States of America, I thank God for my life here every day! I am so excited to work with the children in Ukraine. I try to imagine what it will be like, who we will meet, what we will see....I'm so excited to see what HE has in store for our group on this trip. I've also been thinking about who is going to get more out of this trip, the kids....or us?

OK, back to the point of my post....

The farthest from home I have ever been was Hawaii in 2001. From my home state to Hawaii it's around 4,000 miles from here! Wow.

Ukraine is approximately 6,000 miles from Arkansas! 6,000 miles?!?! Too bad I don't have a frequent flyer card with the airline we are using, that would be awesome mileage.

Ukraine Facts:
Capital: Kiev
Location: Eastern Europe, between Poland and Romania, and Moldova and Russia in the east.
Regions: Ukraine is divided into 24 regions or oblasts
Languages: Ukrainian, Russian, Polish, Romanian, and Hungarian
Gained independence from the Soviet Union on August 24, 1991
Time Zone: 7 hours ahead of Eastern Time Zone, which makes it 8 hours ahead of us? Right? :)
Historical Fact: the Chernobyl nuclear disaster happened April 26, 1986 in what is now Ukraine, approximately 60 miles north of the capital city of Kiev.

The region we will be working in is Donetsk, in the eastern part of Ukraine. We will fly into this region and then travel to Kiev to return home. And I am going to look at the 15 hour train ride from Donetsk to Kiev as more time to experience as much of the country as I can. :)

Also, I use these :) too much. I'm trying to cut back...but I find my habits are VERY hard to break. :) <-see

If you are just now catching onto to our Teamworks Ukraine Mission trip, please read the background on the trip here and read how to help us here!

It's so amazing to watch our trip come together, supplies come in from friends, family and even complete strangers, all in order to better the lives of children 6,000 MILES away!

PS I love my iphone, we are in a very serious relationship. My Aunt Deb refers to it as "that phone." So don't get the wrong impression, I love technology. It can just be frustrating sometimes....

Ukraine- Ways to Help!

We have several ways set up to make contributions for our upcoming mission trip to Ukraine to work with children with special needs. Here they are:

Prayers:

Please keep our group in your prayers as we prepare for this trip and while we travel. Specifically prayers for safe travels for our group, that our information is well received, that our recommendations are carried out after we leave, and that we show God's love to everyone we meet!

Monetary/Supply donations can be mailed to:

Ukraine Therapy Project
c/o Children's Therapy TEAM
2474 E Joyce BLVD, STE 2
Fayetteville, AR 72703

**Checks should be made payable to New Heights Church with "Ukraine Trip" in the memo. All donations are 100% TAX DEDUCTIBLE
We will be building customized equipment for children that have physical impairments. This equipment will require us purchasing most of the supplies once we arrive in Ukraine. Monetary donations will make these purchases possible.

Wal-Mart Wish List Registry:

We have a wish list registry on www.walmart.com or available to be printed in the store.
To locate the registry use the following information:

First Name: Ukraine
Last Name: Team
Month: April 2010
State: Arkansas

Sammons Preston Supply List:
Go to:
www.sammonspreston.com

User ID: Team Ukraine
Password: April 2010

Go to supply lists, and you can view items we would like to have for our trip.

We also need some other specific supplies (cleft palate feeders, etc.) and if you would like information about ordering those items for us, please leave a comment and with your email address and I will be happy to send you some specific links to those items!

Monetary Donations can also be made online now:
Please go to www.99balloons.org
And click on Donate

Our Ukraine Mission Team is now under the umbrella of the non-profit organization here in Northwest Arkansas called 99 Balloons. 99 Balloons was created to celebrate the life of Eliot Mooney. I won't attempt to explain their story, because I could never do it justice. But we are so excited HE has brought our Ukraine Team and 99 Balloons together. This is a video of the story of Eliot and their precious 99 days with him:





Thank you! Amy

Ukraine Video's!

Here are two videos I wanted to share.

The First:
It's several adoptions stories compiled into one video. All of the children in the video have been adopted from Ukraine from the same orphanage we are going to be working at in April.
Also, I know all the children and parents personally and think they are all wonderful! :)

Our Ukraine Adoption Story from Amanda Clark on Vimeo.

The Second:

Here is a short video that shows the work done last year by the group that went. I am so excited to be able to go this year!

Ukraine Orphans & Special Needs from Jim Evans on Vimeo.

More Ukraine Information

Here is our flyer for our upcoming mission trip to Ukraine to help children with special needs. It has specifics regarding donation of supplies and financial contributions. If you would like to read about more background regarding this trip, please see my previous post here. Also, all financial contributions are tax deductible. Thank you!

Here's some pictures from previous trips that I had to share.







Looking at these sweet faces, breaks my heart. I can't wait to be there and hold them all in my arms!!!!

NYE and Liberty Bowl

We initially had intentions of a very low key NYE weekend. But when the Hogs announced they were Liberty Bowl bound...our plans changed. We spent the weekend in Memphis and enjoyed some good food and fun at the game with some friends.

The game was fun until I was frozen completely, and then I was just miserable. I was too cold to operate a camera, so Kati will have to email me some pics from the game (hint hint). The highlights of the weekend for me were definitely BBQ at Rendevous, eating at Big Foot and the paratroopers dropping into the Liberty Bowl!!

We had NYE dinner at Automatic Slim's downtown in Memphis. The service was super slow, but we had a good time. Afterwards we walked to Beale street to watch the guitar drop. Oh my, people watching at it's best! We made some friends from East Carolina and made a bee-line out of there after the guitar dropped. It helped that I had a Memphis police officer in full SWAT team attire following behind me walking out. People seemed to move out of the way for him. And I was just trying to keep moving as to not be in his way. HAHA. We then went to one of my other FAVE Memphis places...Big Foot...or as they call it now, the Kooky Kanuck. They had music and fried pickles. What more do you need? (We visited Big Foot several more times over the weekend for S'mores and giant chocolate chip cookies!)

While at Rendevous we had one of the oldest waiters, I say that because many of them have been there FOREVER. He told us how long he had worked there and it was something like 40 years. Serving BBQ for 40 years!! No wonder he doesn't write anything down when he takes an order. When I asked for a side that didn't come with my meal I though he seriously might kick me out. But he was charming, in an old and crazy way.

New Years Eve Dinner at Automatic Slim's

Bryan, myself and Johnny at Automatic Slim's

Waiting on a table at my favorite place Rendevous

Some of these fellas have been serving BBQ longer than I have been alive!

Insanity known as NYE on Beale. packed.

Boys and Beale

Going to Dinner!

Officially Ukraine Bound!

As of Friday we officially have our flight booked to travel to Ukraine to work with special needs children. Our group which is made up of mainly therapists (physical, occupational and speech therapists) will be traveling April 10-18th. We have LOTS of preparations to complete before we travel, and I couldn't be more excited! Please check back for more details and information about how you can help us, help these children. Please go here to Carmen's blog or here to Karen's blog to read about their trip to Ukraine from last year and the exciting progress that is being made. There are multiple entries on each, along with pictures.

The mission of our trip is to provide training and supplies to help special needs children. We will be working with orphans with special needs at orphanages, visiting a hospital with a NICU, helping families who have chosen to raise their children with special needs, and building customized equipment such as standers and corner chairs that can help children with physical impairments (I personally won't be building these...haha...but will definitely be assisting as much as possible). The hopes of our training and supply donations will be to keep as many children as possible out of institutions. At the age of four, special needs children are typically transferred to institutions...where the conditions are BEYOND bleak and the mortality rate is very high. The stories of these children have definitely touched me, and I can't wait to go and share my knowledge with caregivers and parents there (as well as love on as many kiddos as possible) in the hopes that we help give them a future.

For those of you who do not know, I am a Speech-Language Pathologist. Myself and the other half of the Ukraine Speech TEAM is my dear friend Carmen. We will be providing training and help in the areas of education in language development, facilitating language development, feeding and swallowing, and hopefully setting up some kind of communication system for any child who needs a way of communicating other than speech. I feel that we will in no way be prepared for every child we meet. But I know our actions will definitely be guided, because we will be in HIS hands......and that we will be able to roll with the punches...so to speak. :)

Please keep our group in your prayers while we prepare for this trip, specifically that our travels go smoothly and safely, that our information is well received, that our training and suggestions are carried over after we leave, and last but not least that we show God's love to everyone we meet as we work with these children.

I will post more information, detailed supply list that we will be collecting and background information about our trip later. But wanted to announce that I will be going and to please check back for updates on our preparations for the trip! Thank you! Amy


"No man stands as tall as when he stoops to help a child." -Abraham Lincoln